In Old Armenian the words հոգի(hogi) and ոգի(ogi) were merely alternative spellings of each other. In modern Armenian they have different shades: the first corresponds to English soul and Russian душа(duša), the second to English spirit and Russian дух(dux).

The word has the following combining forms: հոգի-(hogi-) (stressed), հոգե-(hoge-) (unstressed); post-classically also հոգ-(hog-) (near a vowel), հոգի-(hogi-) and հոգիա-(hogia-) (unstressed), հոգէ-(hogē-) (misspelling of the second combining form).